Start-Ups

Start-Ups

Over the past decade, Ignite teamed up with government, industry, and research institutes to create the ideal ecosystem to innovate, commercialize, and grow great businesses. As a result, we're becoming known as the Start-Up Capital of Canada.

It helps that we started with a strong foundation. Fredericton is home to over 70% of the province’s knowledge industry and more than 75% of all publicly-funded research. We have the fourth highest university educated population in Canada. Oh, and we’ve had over a $1 Billion in technology exits in the past 5 years.

The people who live here (and who WANT to live here) are good at dreaming up the Next Big Thing. We help them turn their ideas into action in the fastest, most exciting, and impactful ways possible.

We’ve invested in our digital infrastructure, our entrepreneurial programming, our funding, and our facilities to align them to meet the needs of high growth potential start-ups.

Business Incubators

Fredericton entrepreneurs can choose between 5 award-winning business incubators and entrepreneurship programs, depending on their needs and background.

Planet Hatch offers the Propel Launch and Build programs, as well as Accler8. Entrepreneurs benefit from mentorship from some of Canada’s biggest names in start-up success stories.

In addition to Planet Hatch, Fredericton start-ups also have access to:

The Pond-Desphande Centre- Focused on accelerating social innovation and entrepreneurship, PDC offers programming and funding in three streams: Social Innovation; Technology Ignition; and Student Catalyst.

Hive- Hive is Canada’s first business incubator for immigrant entrepreneurs and is offered through the Fredericton Chamber of Commerce and provincial government

PropelICT- Through its Launch36 program, this virtual accelerator helps entrepreneurs with funding, mentorship, knowledge, and support.

UNB- Students can develop their entrepreneurial ideas into actual businesses through the International Business & Entrepreneurship Centre (IBEC), the Technology Management & Entrepreneurship (TME) Program, and the Summer Institute, part of the Global Accelerator Network.